ART ENCLOSURES - Residencies for visiting international artists in Venice

This came today via Facebook … It's tight, I know but maybe its still of use to somebody!?

ART ENCLOSURES - Residencies for visiting international artists in Venice:

Call for Applications (2009 – 2010)

The Fondazione di Venezia is pleased to announce the second phase of the residency program Art Enclosures which began in 2008 in cooperation with Polymnia Venezia and the Bevilacqua La Masa Foundation in Venice, with the aim of building bridges between local realities and contemporary arts production from abroad.

The upcoming residency will take place in Venice from 20th January to 20th April 2010.

The project consists in a three-month residency period offering a series of activities and an opportunity for visibility to two emerging artists under 40 from the African continent.

Application deadline: 7 November 2009

We would be grateful if you could assist us in informing of this opportunity all the artists that may be interested in applying to our project.

Attached please find the letter that explains the open call in greater detail.

For more information please contact:

Fondazione Bevilaqua La Masa Mara Ambrozic Curator Dorsoduro 2826 / 30123 Venezia t. + 39 041 5207797 / f. +39 041 5208955 m. +39 329 2024596 atelier@bevilacqualamasa.it www.bevilacqualamasa.it

Fondazione di Venezia Marco Zavagno Dorsoduro 3488/U / 30123 Venezia t. + 39 041 2201253 / f. + 39 041 2201239 a.stradella@fondazionedivenezia.org www.fondazionedivenezia.org

And: Yinka Shonibare on Art 21. Not sure whether or how I can embed the video but here’s the link to the video.

Also, a new exhibition Identity: An Imagined State at the Centre of Contemporary Arts in Lagos opens 31 October 2009 and will

‘bring together for the first time works by twelve established and emerging artists of different cultural, geographic and social backgrounds from Nigeria, Africa, and South America. Their works consider from both local and global perspective, the issues around identity in relation to Africa. As a point of departure, the exhibition explores associations with the label ‘African’ and has been contextualized in a manner that reflects on, but without answering, ‘what or who is an African.’ By exploring these themes the exhibition tells the story of belonging, displacement, uncertainty, visibility and negotiation through the medium of video art.’

Participating artists include Jude Anogwih (Nig), Lucy Azubuike (Nig), Uchay Joel Chima (Nig), Luc Fosther Diop (CAM), Bouchra Khalili( MOR/FR), Vanessa Padilla (ECU), Thando Mama (SA), Grace Ndiritu (KEN/UK), Emeka Ogboh(NIG), Berni Searle (SA), Aicha Thiam (SEN) and Kemang Wa Lehulere (SA).

Curated by Jude Anogwih and Oyinda Fakeye.

There was a time when I was writing quite a bit about iconoclasm here and there will be more to come as I finally, finally got my hands on a copy (not just the limited preview offered by Google Books but the whole book) of Ramon Sarro’s The Politics of Religious Change on the Upper Guinea Coast. More on that some time next week, I think. For the moment being, note that the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in New York has sponsored an online forum discussion of the relationship between religion and modern art entitled The Spiritual (Re)Turn. (This links you to the first session)

Maybe its apt I acknowledge that I got the news about this online forum discussion via an article on Religion Dispatches. It contains the following lines pointing out that the detachment of art from religion occurring in 18^th century Europe was in fact a specifically (Euro?) Christian development. - And as such, I’m tempted to add, not the establishment of a new universal standard of what it means to be civilized that then could be applied around the world to mark anybody who dared to disagree as barbaric without consideration of their motivations – which, btw. is where Sarro comes in. Anyway, here the lines:

The Pope correctly reminded the Rabbi that they do not have this book in common, that Christians not only read the Commandments differently, but no longer think all of them are in force. […]

Pope Clement XIII opened what is called the “Profane Museum” inside the Vatican Palace as early as 1767. […]

So a Rabbi and a Pope had a quick quarrel about the Ten Commandments in front of the first public art museum in the world. Where they disagreed most sharply was over the status of the second commandment. In the late 18th century, Art was being subtly detached from Religion, the Christian religion that is, as a separate source of public/private epiphanies.

Art was the new religion, and museums were their new temples. This profound cultural movement has not come to rest in our own time.

BBC on Rebranding Nigeria

I’ve not seen the programme yet – told you about the accident with my laptop and I’m not that keen on watching films/listening to the radio in the uni computer lab - but if you’re in the UK you can find it on the IPlayer (until 31 October 2009) – I haven’t yet found a version on Youtube but will keep my eyes open. Here, anyway, is a related BBC Worldservice programme (audio only)

And, like always there is already a lively debate among Nigerians online … check out Nairaland for a start!